


The Dragon Woman

by HannibabestheCannibabes



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst, Denial of Feelings, DragonQueen, F/F, Love, Motherhood, Pain, Realisation of feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-03
Updated: 2016-03-03
Packaged: 2018-05-24 13:49:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6155671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HannibabestheCannibabes/pseuds/HannibabestheCannibabes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A one-shot look at Maleficent's feelings about Regina and the loss of her daughter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Dragon Woman

** The Dragon Woman **

Maleficent had never seen herself as a woman. Not in the way she was supposed to. When she was younger, when she lived in the Enchanted Forest amongst its people rather than on its barren outskirts, she’d watched the women around her distantly. She’d watched as they went about their daily lives in dainty dresses, linked arm in arm with other young women. From behind thick curtains in her castle, the castle she’d inhabited before her villainy saw her banished, she’d watched as the women her age swooned over men, all men from the blacksmith to the knights. She watched as the women became more and more heartbroken with each passing day of unrequited attraction, confused as to how everyone but her remained oblivious to the perils of love. But then she’d never seen herself as a woman. Maleficent was only a dragon. And dragons didn’t fall in love.

‘Maleficent, my dear friend.’

Until she met Regina. Maleficent had never felt anything quite like what she felt for the Evil Queen. She put it down to pride originally. Watching as Regina transformed from the meek but eager girl who first entered her castle to the powerfully wicked Queen who came to dominate the Enchanted Forest, how could Maleficent not feel pride? Pride and lust. But lust was easily dealt with, and she wasted no time in ensuring that hers was sated. Just the thought of the Evil Queen, her bare skin illuminated in the candlelight, face flushed, limbs wrapped around her fellow villain, was enough to cause Maleficent’s heart to pound. It went beyond that though. For once, just once, she felt her heart soften, her guard drop. She felt herself confess to secrets and feelings that had been locked up for years. And she’d watched Regina smile, a smile that meant far more than anything Maleficent had been given in many, many years. For the first time, Maleficent felt her lips moving against her will as she lay in bed, soundlessly forming the words ‘ _I love you’_ against the night air. But dragons don’t fall in love.

Regina’s betrayal hurt, she couldn’t hide that. The embraces, the secrets, had all been for nought beyond the stealing of the Dark Curse. It cut her as deeply as it would if Regina had ripped her heart out. If she had just lost Regina, the pain would have healed, she was certain of that. But the wound cut further. That curse was hers; she needed it for her own happy ending- the retrieval of her child. Maleficent had never expected to become a mother. She’d sat for years in her castle, wishing for the death of a child, feeling nothing but venomous hatred that dripped from her tongue in curses. She was no mother. That was until she felt the life growing inside her, and felt no anger, no resentment for the strength it took from her. Instead she felt warmth, protectiveness. She understood now why mothers locked their children from the World, guarded them from the evil that lived there. With her baby, she could find forgiveness, she felt that. Maybe not from the World, but then she’d never cared so much for the World, but she could forgive herself. If she could love this child, teach it, raise it, she could forgive herself. Maleficent made this bargain with herself, only to watch as her child was lost to her, ripped from her hands. And yet the pain she felt didn’t stop the World turning. She was only a dragon. And dragons can’t fall in love.

It was in that state that the Dark Curse took her. Once more she found herself alone, trapped, but this time her heart wasn’t frozen in hatred. Maleficent may have sat confined to dragon form, but it was in that cave that she finally understood what it was like to be a woman in her World. Betrayed by one she had loved and had thought loved her in return, her only child stolen from her and cast beyond her reach, she felt her once hard heart shatter within her breast. She was a woman. And women fall in love.


End file.
